Spiritual Slavery to Spiritual Sonship (12 page)

Paul says in Romans,
“For I consider that sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us”
(Rom. 8:18 NAS). Inheritance comes only after enduring the “sufferings of this present time.” Part of that suffering is patient obedience—being subject to Father’s mission rather than our own. No matter how hard the present seems to be, and regardless of how difficult it seems sometimes to wait, nothing can compare with the glory of the inheritance that will be ours if we are willing to wait for it to come in our Father’s good time.

But that inheritance is for sons and daughters. No sonship, no inheritance. Orphans don’t possess the maturity for it; neither can they be trusted with it. The suffering of obedience builds character. Sons and daughters recognize the value of being subject to Father’s mission … and of waiting for their full inheritance.

T
he father of a friend of mine bought an old, antique, wooden, 18-foot speedboat when peter was a teenager. His dad was prosperous, a member of the yacht club, and wanted to showcase the boat before all his boating buddies. He soon took the old teak boat to a boatyard and asked them to spare no expense in restoring it to mint condition. It took months of painstaking labor to refinish all the wood; install new fittings, chrome, seats, and cushions; remove the old 100-horsepower inboard engine; and install a new one with 400 horsepower.

Upon completion, it appeared to be a work of art, and the father could not wait to show it off to all his friends at the yacht club. In addition, he bought a brand-new trailer to transport the boat and a brand-new Jeep to tow the trailer. Then on a Saturday during the middle of lunch hour when all his buddies were eating at the yacht club restaurant, father and son drove to the launch ramp and lowered the priceless antique into the water in front of all his friends.

A number of his cronies came over and with envy pleaded with him to take them on a trial run out onto the river, but the father reserved the honor for him and his son. He took off from the yacht club full throttle and did a few spins back and forth for all to see as he gloated over his prized possession. Then he came racing back to the dock in front of the restaurant, and at the last second threw the gear in reverse at high rpm’s, easing the boat to a stop. However, the force of revving up so much horsepower created a loud thud and water began pouring in from the stern (rear) of the boat.

Screaming at his son and friends to help bail out the water, he ran to get his new Jeep and trailer before the boat sank. Upon pulling the boat out of the water and inspecting the bottom, they found a huge hole in the keel at the stern. The exterior of the 50-year-old wood was varnished and looked like new, but the wood on the inside had dry-rotted during the many years, giving way to the pressures of the high-powered engine. Humiliated in front of his friends, the father’s anger toward the workers at the boatyard exploded with verbal curses and accusation. Enraged, he commanded his son into the Jeep, jumped in, and sped off toward the boatyard to give them a piece of his mind.

In the meantime, blinded by his temper and embarrassment, he had forgotten to strap the boat down to the trailer, and as he was speeding down the road, a person in a car in front of him suddenly slammed on his brakes. When the father slammed on his, the boat slid forward off the new trailer, went through the back window of the new Jeep, and left the bow of the boat sitting in the driver’s seat. The boat was destroyed, the new boat trailer mangled, and the new Jeep had sustained thousands of dollars worth of damages.

The moral of the story and of this chapter
—If you have not dealt with the dry rot in your life, and God turns up the power, you are in danger of blowing your rear end off!

There is a lot of teaching in some quarters of the church today about claiming or taking your inheritance—that your inheritance from God is your right in Christ, and you just need to reach out and take hold of it. There is truth in this reality, but it is not that simple. “Taking” your inheritance and “receiving” it are two different things that can produce two very different results.

Teaching on our inheritance in Christ is important. Many Christians don’t really know who they are or what they have in Christ because no one has ever taught them. Inheritance teaching does address a legitimate and serious need within the Body of Christ, but the “take your inheritance now” emphasis can be easily misleading or misunderstood. An inheritance taken by an orphan heart with orphan thinking is in danger of blowing his rear end off. If we have not embraced healthy accountability relationships, the anointing can quickly empower us and take us places where our character may not be able to keep our boat afloat.

What parents in their right mind would release a $1 million inheritance to a 21-year-old son or daughter who is a drug or alcohol addict or who is immature and irresponsible in behavior? Rather, they would be wise to put the inheritance in a trust fund to be released when the child demonstrates the maturity needed to handle his inheritance in a responsible manner.

A premature inheritance almost always ends up in waste. Remember what happened to the prodigal son. He took his inheritance early, and as Jesus said in Luke 15:13, quickly “squandered his estate in loose living.” Why? Because his character was not mature enough to take responsibility for his father’s mission. The prodigal son was an orphan at heart, and his orphan thinking was not yet responsible enough to be a wise manager of the inheritance.

In the same way, when we insist on taking our inheritance
now
instead of waiting until we grow into maturity and allowing our Father to give it to us freely, we may end up consuming the blessings of God upon our own lusts. That’s what happened to me when I left Captain Kline to work for the man who promised to make me captain right away. Because I valued the inheritance more than relationship, I left behind a trail of broken relationships. My orphan heart was too immature to appreciate fully the value of accountability and covenant relationships.

Here are a few characteristics of immaturity. Notice how each one also reflects characteristics of an orphan heart:

1. Immaturity is a slave to circumstances and emotions. Our circumstances determine whether we have a “good hair day” or “bad hair day.”
   

2. Immaturity is a slave to self, seeking to meet personal needs at others’ expense.
   

3. Immaturity seeks the place of comfort, ease, least resistance, and whatever makes us feel valued and affirmed.
   

4. Immaturity obeys out of a fear of loss or punishment, not because we do not want to grieve the one we love.
   

5. Immaturity values people for what they can do for us, not for relationship. Thus, we unconsciously use and manipulate people to meet our needs.
   

6. Immaturity demands its own way or nothing. “If you do not play my way, I am going to take my ball and go home.”
   

7. Immaturity is subject to its own mission. Our thoughts continually gravitate toward me, myself, and I.
   

8. Immaturity is “obtain-oriented”: “How does this benefit me?” Our choices are influenced by what we can gain.
   

9. Immaturity is self-centered, self-consuming, and self-referential. “Let’s talk about you for a while … have you read my book yet?”
   

Paul says that as Christians
“we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ”
(Rom. 8:16b-17a NAS). “Children” here is
teknon
in Greek, the word for an immature child. Even as immature children, then, we are heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ. This means that the fullness of Christ—everything we see in Him—is our inheritance. It all belongs to us. But that does not mean that we are supposed to get it all right now. In Galatians 4:1-7, Paul describes how a young child is an heir to everything yet does not actually assume ownership until the time set by the father. And until that time, the child can often feel more like a slave than an heir.

In the culture of Paul’s day, a son was under the care and authority of tutors until he reached the age of 12, at which time he became apprenticed to his father. For the next 18 years, until the age of 30, the son worked as his father’s apprentice, learning from his father everything about the family business or trade. Unlike the hired workers who received regular wages, the son often received no pay during his apprenticeship. Why? Because everything was provided for him by his father. He was still living in his father’s house under his father’s authority and care. His “pay” was learning from his father all the skills and trade secrets of their profession. Hired hands received wages, but the son was heir to the business. He had to wait, to “suffer” through his time of apprenticeship until he was responsible and mature in his knowledge and understanding of his father’s business.

Normally, at the age of 30, the son completed his apprenticeship and was ready to receive his inheritance. At that time, if the son had proven himself faithful and remained in patient submission as a son subject to his father’s mission, his father would buy or build him a house and establish him in his own business, where he would be set for life. As a child, the inheritance was always his, but first he had to show himself faithful with what his father had put into his hands. Jesus said that those who are faithful with a little will be put in charge of much (see Matt. 25:21).

Receiving our inheritance means first “suffering” by being faithful with little as we learn to take responsibility for much and being subject to Father’s mission. Then our character is ready to handle God turning up the power.

Before we receive our inheritance in Christ as fellow heirs with Him, we first suffer with Him. Paul said that we are children of God, heirs of God, and fellow heirs with Christ. Continuing with the rest of that verse and the verse following, he says:
“… if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to
us” (Rom. 8:17-18 NAS).

Full entry into our inheritance as heirs with Christ involves suffering with Him for the greater glory to come. And how did Jesus suffer? Most of us think immediately of His suffering on the Cross, and that is certainly correct. However, only Jesus could die on the Cross for our sins. The only way we can suffer with Him in that way is in the figurative sense of “dying” to self and taking up our cross daily and following Him (see Luke 9:23)—in other words, dealing with the interior dry rot (motives) and not just having an attractive exterior. We begin to displace being subject to our own
mission and seek to become committed to His mission. Paul described it this way: “I
have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me”
(Gal. 2:20 NAS). Paul had come to a defining moment in life where he chose to be subject to Father’s mission, and no longer his own, even if it was uncomfortable for him.

Jesus suffered on the Cross, but there is more involved with His suffering than just the Cross. Through His suffering, Jesus learned obedience—willing submission to the mission of others, especially His Father. The Cross was the ultimate demonstration of His submissive obedience. A companion passage to Romans 8:17-18 is Hebrews 5:7-9:

Even Jesus had to go through “the sufferings of this present time.” He had to learn the whole walk of sonship because, once His public ministry began, the enemy was going to do everything possible to get Him to think like an orphan. A lot was riding on this. If satan could succeed in deceiving Jesus into orphan thinking, then Jesus never could be our Savior because He would become subject to satan’s mission rather than His Father’s. None of us then could be saved; none of us could experience the fullness of Father’s love or of His gifts in our lives. Before Jesus could become the source of eternal salvation, He had to learn the obedience of a son and walk in a spirit of sonship.

In the same way, our gifts and calling are in danger of blowing our rear end off until we learn obedience from what we suffer as spiritual sons and daughters to someone. Whose son are you? Whose daughter are you? Do you value people for relationship or for what they can do for you?

How did Jesus learn obedience? First, by being in submission to his earthly parents and then to His heavenly Father. In his childhood years, Jesus learned to love, obey, honor, and respect His earthly parents. A major shift began to occur when Jesus visited the Temple in Jerusalem at the age of 12 and culminated with the inauguration of His public ministry 18 years later at the age of 30. This period coincides with the time Jesus would have been apprenticed to His earthly father, Joseph, in the carpenter shop. His honor and submission to His earthly father was part of the apprenticeship to His heavenly Father and part of being subject to His mission.

Luke tells us that when Jesus was 12, He, Mary, and Joseph traveled to Jerusalem for the Passover, as was their custom. Starting home after the weeklong festival, Mary and Joseph assumed Jesus was somewhere in the caravan with friends or relatives, and traveled for an entire day before missing Him. Unknown to them, Jesus had stayed behind in Jerusalem. After they discovered He was not with them, Mary and Joseph returned to the city to look for Him.